By Jim Kinney | jkinney@repub.com
SPRINGFIELD — Staffing at local Social Security offices is down 40% since January, said Rafael Castillo, the American Federation of Government Employees shop steward at the office on Bond Street
“Longer wait times,” Castillo said in a follow-up interview. “Slower service. They have to bring staff in from other departments just to cover.”
Castillo, a claims specialist at the Bond Street office, spoke with U.S. Rep. Richard E. Neal, D-Springfield, Friday. Neal, the ranking Democrat on the House Ways & Means Committee responsible for Social Security, hosted a celebration, complete with cake, marking 90 years and one day since President Franklin Roosevelt signed Social Security into law on Aug. 14, 1935.
Social Security cut more than 7,000 from its workforce this year as part of the Department of Government Efficiency’s reorganization of the federal work force.
The Social Security office on Bond Street saw a steady stream of visitors Friday.
Some came with appointments, some with only problems. Lost paperwork. A missing Social Security card.
But inside many of the study carrels that allow people to meet privately with staff were empty, unused.
Neal told Castillo he and his fellow Democrats are working to reverse the cuts. It’s not the first time he’s heard of the complaint.
“There are some notable delays now,” Neal told reporters later. “And that’s the result of the erroneous argument that somehow there was not efficiency in Social Security.”
Nearly one in five Massachusetts residents, 1.3 million people, receive Social Security payments, putting $28.4 billion into the state’s economy every year. This includes 185,955 residents in the First District who receive $328 million in monthly benefits.
“When I heard Elon Musk say that it was a Ponzi scheme, that implies that it’s illicit. It’s one of the most important achievements in American history,” Neal said. “And one number that’s really important, less than 1% of the checks that are sent out, less than 1% are attributed to any sort of fraudulent behavior. There was nothing to that argument.”
The staff cutbacks came while Social Security was processing new claims from retired public employees, said Shawn Duhamel, CEO of Mass Retirees Association. In January, at the close of his term, President Joe Biden signed legislation ending the windfall elimination provision and effectively increasing social security for government retirees and their survivors.
Duhamel said he’s hearing from recipients now who are getting more money.
Social Security faces challenges. The go-broke date — the date at which Social Security will no longer have enough funds to pay full benefits — has been moved up to 2034.
But Neal said Congress and the Reagan White House fixed a far worse set of challenges in 1983.
“And when I hear people say that Social Security is going broke, that’s not true. Social Security, if we did nothing in eight years, would still pay 80%, 75 to 80% of benefits,” Neal said. “But we understand that our obligation is to make sure we keep 100% of benefits and also to make sure that those cost-of-living increases happen.”
Neal went on to explain statistical trends that change Social Security, including that undocumented immigrants pay $22 billion a year into the Social Security trust fund. But those immigrants are unlikely to ever claim the benefit.
“So it’s birth rates, it’s cutbacks in immigration, and it’s also a trending reality that we’re living longer,” Neal said. “If you were doing this in 1900, life expectancy was about 47 years old for a male. Today it’s like 78. So there are some realities, and we should be able to make those improvements, adjustments.”
Despite all the rhetoric from Republicans, Social Security remains the “third rail” of American politics. Touch it, you suffer the consequences.
“Some of my colleagues in Congress over the years, they’ve always talked about the privatization plan for Social Security. In all my years, there’s never been a vote on one of those plans,” Neal said. “So it’s kind of vacuous talk rather than reality.”
Neal invited Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley to participate in the 90th anniversary in honor of Frances Perkins, architect of Social Security and much of the New Deal. She was U.S. Secretary of Labor from 1933 to 1945.
